Don't walk—run

In Australia, on a busy street, you have a 'walk' and 'don't walk' sign to tell you when to cross the road.

In Phnom Penh many intersections don't have lights. You have to get across the best way you can. Sometimes cars and motorcycles are going in all directions and even on the footpath.

Some busy intersections now have lights and also signs to help pedestrians. When the light turns green there are two lights to guide you. The top one tells you how many seconds you have to get across. The bottom one is animated and shows someone—no, they're not walking—they look like they're really running across the street.

I'm not sure but they seem to go faster as the time runs out.

Trikes

In Australia mostly little kids ride tricycles. Here in Thailand and other Asian countries it is very common to see adults riding tricycles. Some have motors and some have pedals. Here are two motorcycle tricycles that I saw in my street the other day.




love from Grandpa

Basket vendor

A vendor is someone who sells something. In most Asian countries you can see many vendors in the streets. Some set up stalls and sell to people who pass, just like a little shop on the side of the road. Some vendors walk carrying whatever it is they are selling.

This vendor has a motorbike with a sidecar. He has all different kinds of baskets that he sells to people. The baskets are used for many different purposes.

In this picture you can hardly see the vendor. The men wearing orange vests are motorcycle-taxi drivers. If you take a bus home it stops along the main road. Perhaps you live a long way from the main road and it is too far to walk. You can take a motorcycle taxi. They will drive you to your home.

I don't know what kind of baskets the motorcycle-taxi drivers bought but they look very interested in these baskets.

PS. At the moment I live just around the corner from this spot.

love from Grandpa

Free the birds

When we visited Wat Sala Loi in Korat there was a man who had these birds in a cage. They were for sale. When people buy them they don't take them home. These are not pet birds, they are wild birds. People buy them to set them free. They think that by setting the birds free they will make merit.

The next day the man will be back at the temple selling wild birds again. He has caught some more. Maybe they are even the same birds. I don't think there is any merit from buying these birds. If people stopped buying the birds the man would stop catching them and selling them. The birds would always be free. What do you think?

Very thin Buddha

Before the Buddha became the Buddha he was a prince. He had everything that money could buy. OK, he didn't have a Playstation or any other gaming equipment. They hadn't been invented in those days. But he was rich enough that he could have anything that had been invented.

His name was Siddhattha Gotama. Sometimes you'll see that spelt differently but it is probably still the same person. Anyway, he grew up with everything his parents, the king and queen, could buy him. When he grew up he fell in love and married and his wife had a son. But there were things about life he did not understand. He knew that no matter how much people had they still experienced suffering. He knew this but he didn't know why. So he left the palace and his family and became an ascetic. An ascetic is a person who lives life with almost nothing usually for religious reasons.

Siddhattha had some teachers who taught him all they knew but he still didn't have all the answers. At one point he didn't eat anything for a long, long time and became very thin. He almost died. And it didn't work either so he started eating again.



In Asia there are many beautiful statues of the Buddha but the ones I don't see very often are the ones of Siddhattha when he was very thin. When I was in Korat I was wandering around Wat Phayup. At the back, under a Bodhi Tree there was a statue of Siddhattha when he was very thin so I took this picture for you.

There is another picture like this here.

Cave temple

Once I went to a Buddhist temple that was inside a big cave, a real cave. In Korat there is one they call 'the cave in the city'. But it is not a real cave.

Phra Raj Wimonmelee, the head monk of Wat Phayup, once found some pieces of rock that had come from inside a cave. There had been an explosion, perhaps the cave was in a mine and it was blown up. When Phra Raj Wimonmelee found it many of the stalactites and stalagmites were there as well as other rocks from inside the cave. He bought them and had them sent back to his temple. There a cave was constructed inside a building. When you go into the building it is like you are inside a cave.

love from Grandpa

Temple dogs

Buddhist monks must never harm a living thing. Usually they will not even kill a mosquito. To kill anything, even a mosquito, is to make bad karma. If you go to a Buddhist temple it is OK to wear an insect repellent to keep the mosquitos away from you but you shouldn't kill them.

Lots of animals seem to know that they are safe in a Buddhist monastery and they make their way there. If there is a river next to the wat often the fish come to that spot and monks or other people feed them. There is even one temple in Thailand that is famous because of the tigers there. No one harms the tigers and the tigers don't harm anyone but they are still wild tigers.

In Thailand there are many stray dogs. People often feed stray dogs because that is a way of making merit. Often the dogs find their way to Buddhist temples and the monks look after them. It is usual to see lots of dogs as well as other animals in Buddhist temples in Thailand.

When I visited Wat Phayup with Nid we saw this dog. Its back legs seemed to be a little crippled. It could still walk but its legs didn't work properly. If it tried to scratch itself with its left hind leg, the leg wouldn't reach the itchy spot. The dog would keep trying but just kept going around in circles. We felt sorry for this dog but in the end he needed to scratch his right side and that worked. So then we were happy for it.

love from Grandpa